


When Am I Going To Get Over This?

by kissoffools



Category: Falsettos - Lapine/Finn
Genre: Exes, M/M, Meddling Kids, Missing Scene, Phone Calls & Telephones, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:34:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28140018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kissoffools/pseuds/kissoffools
Summary: Two years after Marvin and Whizzer's breakup, Jason tracks Whizzer down for some baseball advice.
Relationships: Whizzer Brown/Marvin
Comments: 18
Kudos: 43
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	When Am I Going To Get Over This?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SingARoundelay](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SingARoundelay/gifts).



“Whizzer?” 

Whizzer works at a bar. He mixes drinks and pours beer and hands out shots. Small voices saying his name aren’t typical in his line of work, even when it’s three pm and the place is effectively a ghost town.

He leans over the bar and his eyes land on Jason.

The kid is bigger than when he last saw him - taller, mostly - and his hair has gotten a little wilder. He has a gangliness to him now that Whizzer remembers going through himself, too, when he was twelve. It’s hard to see Jason, this much time later. And it hits Whizzer that when he left, two years ago, he never got to say goodbye to the kid. 

Which sucks, now that he’s thinking about it.

“Hi, Jason,” he says, his tone more than a little bewildered. He’s trying to stay surprised and not let the irritation that’s beginning to rise in his chest win out. Not that he’s irritated at the kid - after all, _he_ wasn’t the one that threw him out after losing a dumb chess game like a petty, small-minded, annoying, beautiful-when-he’s-angry, childish - 

Okay, going down _that_ rabbit hole certainly isn’t helping.

He shakes his head just slightly to try and clear it. “What are you doing here?” Whizzer asks, wiping his hands on a dish rag. He steps out from behind the bar and moves over to the boy. “Does your mom know?” 

“We got out of school early,” Jason shrugs. “I remember you had a t-shirt from this place and you told me that you worked here.” 

“Okay,” Whizzer says, thinking that this still isn’t explanation enough for his liking, but they’re getting somewhere. Why was the son of his ex - his most significant ex, if he’s being honest - showing up at his place of work on a random Tuesday afternoon? “So what can I do for you, Jason?” 

The kid hops up onto a bar stool and Whizzer sincerely hopes no cops decide to come wandering by. The appearance of serving a twelve-year-old surely isn’t a good look. 

“I want you to come to my baseball game.” 

Whizzer’s eyebrows raise up towards his hairline. “Your what?” 

“I’m playing baseball this year,” Jason says, kicking his feet out a bit. “And I don’t think I’m very good.” 

_So you want me to come watch you be bad at it?,_ is his first thought. One he fortunately manages to keep from escaping his mouth. 

“Have you been practicing?” he says instead. _Much better._

Jason shrugs. “Kind of.” His eyes lower and he kicks his feet more. “My dad tries to help me sometimes, but it’s not like he’s Joe Montana.”

Whizzer decides to ignore that confusing comparison. He can sense where this is going, and he isn’t sure he’s on board. “Aw, come on, I’m sure he does all right.” He’s very sure that Marvin doesn’t - not when it comes to sports. But anything to keep the kid’s next words out of his - 

“Will you come and help me?” 

There it is.

“Jason…” What are the words to let down a child gently? 

“Please?” Jason asks, lifting his head again. His big, round puppy-dog eyes find Whizzer’s and he can immediately feel his resolve beginning to crumble. “I’m not good, but I want to be better. I know you like baseball and you know how to play. I just thought that if you came, and you helped me, I might actually be able to hit the ball or something.” 

Damn this sweet child and the surprising ways he’s able to worm himself into Whizzer’s heart so easily. He can see flashes of Marvin in the kid, in his jaw, in the way he holds himself, and that does all kinds of confusing things to him. He loves Jason, thinks he’s a great kid - but the thought of seeing his father again, after this much time…

He’s never wanted to say both _no_ and _yes_ this badly before. 

“Please,” Jason repeats, his voice a little smaller this time. “Everyone’s laughing at me.” 

Oh, _damn it_. 

“Okay,” Whizzer finds himself saying. “I’ll come to your game.” 

The smile that erupts on the kid is enough to light up the entire bar. 

“Awesome!” Jason exclaims. He jumps down from the bar stool and punches his fist in the air with excitement. “It’s at four on Saturday, at the field near my dad’s house!”

Even hearing the words _my dad’s house_ makes Whizzer want to throw up a little. He knows that house so well. The brick exterior, the big windows overlooking the backyard, the grey couch in the living room where he and Marvin started to watch so many movies and never saw the endings. Having to leave that house was one of the more painful things he’d done in the last few years, and he certainly isn’t eager to return.

But he won’t be going to the house, he reminds himself. Just to the baseball diamond a block away. 

“You got it, kid,” Whizzer says, and no matter how apprehensive he feels about everything he’s just agreed to, he can’t help but feel pleased that he’s made Jason smile like this.

Jason reaches out and wraps his arm around Whizzer’s waist in a tight little hug. “You’re the best, Whizzer.”

Jason is almost out the door again when Whizzer finally asks the question he’s wanted to ask ever since the mop-haired kid showed up in the first place. 

“How’s your dad?” 

Jason turns back and shrugs. “He’s okay. I don’t think he’s very happy.” 

An interesting twist in Whizzer’s chest. “Really.” He tries not to frame it as a question. 

“He’s dated a bit, but not for awhile. And all of them kind of sucked, if you ask me.” 

He can’t help but exhale a chuckle. “Is that so?” 

Jason shrugs again. “None of them were you.” 

The kid leaves, and Whizzer has to sit down. He isn’t used to having his past crash back into his life like this - especially not in the form of a doe-eyed little boy whose father broke his heart. Tore it to shreds, actually. And didn’t even return all the pieces. 

He picks up a bar rag and rubs at the countertop, trying to find something else to focus on. Something that isn’t the memory of Marvin’s eyes, his hands, his smile. 

Saturday is going to be _very_ interesting.

***

He doesn’t actually expect Marvin to call.

That’s what people say when they’re being polite, after all. _I’ll give you a call sometime!_ Casual and positive, but gets you off the hook from any actual effort. And, as Whizzer knows all too well, _Marvin_ and _actual effort_ don’t always go hand in hand. So when Marvin asks to call him at Jason's baseball game, he expects to go home and never hear from the man again. No matter how flirty he was being or how good he looked in his stupid maroon hoodie. Lowered expectations, Whizzer has always felt, are the way to handle other human beings.

But Marvin had looked so damn proud as Jason's baseball soared through the air for the first time. And, honestly, Whizzer was a sucker for Marvin's smile. So when Marvin asked if he could call, he found himself saying, _Sure. Why not?_

Because he'll never call and you'll wait by the phone for days and feel a little smaller each hour that passes, and you'll have to remember all over again that he's no good for you. _That's_ why not.

But sure enough, the next morning, the phone rings.

“And here I half thought you’d be a vacuum salesman,” Whizzer says as soon as he hears Marvin’s voice come down the line. It's amazing how easy it is to slip right back into their familiar banter.

“I have a Hoover I can try and pawn off on you, if you’d like.” 

“Please.” Whizzer rolls his eyes. “That thing sucked even less than you did.” 

“Damn, and here I thought I was renowned for my sexual prowess!” Marvin says with a laugh.

“If you were, you wouldn’t have had to ask me to be monogamous.” 

The second the words leave Whizzer’s mouth, he regrets them.

They’re meaner than he intends them to be. They’re a cheap shot, a dig below the belt, one that isn’t even true. Marvin’s skills in bed had nothing to do with Whizzer’s proclivities for other men - that was a cheap, cruel lie. One with two years’ worth of hurt behind it.

“Wow,” Marvin says finally. “Okay then.”

“Marvin, I didn’t mean that,” Whizzer says quickly. “I’m sorry.”

“I don’t recall you being a man who lies about his feelings,” Marvin says. “So I probably deserve that.” 

He shakes his head, even though he knows Marvin can’t see him. “You don’t. You know exactly how I feel about your prowess.” Great, and now he’s blushing. “I was being a dick and I was trying to hurt you.”

The line is silent for a moment, and then Marvin says, “Listen. How about we try not to do that? I know that was our M.O. before. I don’t know about you, but I’m not the same as I was two years ago. I want you to see that. How about we cut out the jabs?”

Marvin, not snapping back and giving as good as he got? Maybe he really is different than before - something Whizzer is definitely intrigued by. “Deal,” Whizzer agrees. He feels himself relax. 

“Did you enjoy yesterday’s display of Jewish athleticism?” Marvin asks, and Whizzer doesn’t even care that it’s a clear attempt to change the subject. He laughs. 

“It was nice to see Jason play yesterday. He’s got moxie, even though he’s terrible.” 

“He got better after you showed him. Clearly I’ve been slacking on my fatherly duties,” Marvin says.

“Come on, now,” Whizzer says gently, clicking his tongue. “You’re a good dad. Not every father needs to be a baseball pro.” 

“Well, still.” Whizzer can practically hear Marvin’s shrug on the other side of the phone. “I’m glad he had you.”

He smiles a little to himself. “I missed that kid.” 

“Did you miss me?” 

Marvin’s question somehow takes all the breath out of Whizzer. He pauses, his thoughts tumbling around in his brain as he tries to figure out what is and isn’t okay to say. It’s hard to have this conversation, period, but doing it over the phone where he can’t see a glint of playfulness in Marvin’s eye or the twitching muscle in his jaw really makes the whole thing feel more loaded than it already is. 

After a minute, Marvin speaks again. “I’m going to take your silence as a big _fuck, no_ and hang up to go lick my wounds and pretend this never happened.” 

“Don’t,” Whizzer says hurriedly. “I… I miss some of you.” 

“Some of me?” Marvin repeats. 

“The fun side. The sexy side. Not the side that gets jealous and petty and throws me out over a game of chess.” 

A pause, this time on Marvin’s end. “I deserved that,” he says finally. 

Somehow, Whizzer both feels proud that he said it and guilty that he said anything at all. 

“We weren’t always good for each other, you know?” Marvin muses. “And I was an ass. Many times, I was an ass.” 

“I mean… to be fair, half the time I egged you on,” Whizzer concedes. “And a quarter of the time, I was out with someone else.” 

A chuckle. “But for that final quarter of the time, we were perfect for each other,” Marvin says. Whizzer can hear a little smile in Marvin’s voice, and to his surprise, he can feel his lips lifting into a smile of their own.

“We did have our moments,” Whizzer agrees.

“I’m sorry, you know.”

Whizzer’s eyebrows lift in surprise. “You are?” 

“I am.” Marvin’s voice is even, steady. Surprisingly calm. “I’m not very good at all of this, but I’m trying to be. Jason deserves better, and I’m finding that everything is much easier when you don’t try to force it to bend to your will.” 

Whizzer feels a small pang in his chest. They had been together for nine months, all that time ago, and he doesn’t think he’s ever heard Marvin apologize. Not until now. 

“Well… thank you,” Whizzer says finally. Finally.

The conversation gets easier, then. Whizzer doesn’t feel so guarded when they joke, when Marvin tells him about the new merger at his company or asks for stories from the bar. It’s easier to talk about Jason and how he’s grown, the bar mitzvah that Trina’s begun to plan. He can laugh and tease and share without that old edge of sharpness. Without that fear that, with a few biting words, it could all come crumbling down. It almost feels like old times - except it doesn’t. It feels better. 

And when Marvin asks if he can call again tomorrow, Whizzer almost trips over his own tongue in his hurry to say yes. 

“Then I will,” Marvin says, and the warmth in his voice makes Whizzer think of summer. Of lying on the back porch in the sun, head resting on Marvin’s solid chest while they talk. “Tomorrow morning. Same time.”

“Don’t be late,” Whizzer teases with a little grin. 

“Not a chance.” 

Whizzer sets the phone back in its cradle, leaning against the wall. He exhales slowly, turning their conversation over in his mind. Trying to see if there’s anything he missed, anything that should raise warning bells telling him that he’s wandering down the same dangerous path as before. 

But there’s nothing. He doesn’t know if it was time, or distance, or what other myriad of factors came together to make a difference - but he feels like today, during their call, he got the very best Marvin on the line.

And he hopes that’s who calls him tomorrow, too. 

_end._

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Yuletide, SingARoundelay! I love Falsettos so much and getting to dabble in writing these wonderful characters. I loved your prompts that talked about those missing two years for Marvin and Whizzer, and wanted to explore the very beginnings of their reunion just a little bit. I hope you enjoy!


End file.
